Due to an outpouring of more than 2,000 public responses, Parks Canada has delayed its decision on the Glacier Discovery Walk for a couple of weeks.

“With the number of comments we needed more time to thoroughly review them,” said Alisson Ogle, communications officer for Jasper National Park. “We need to take extra time to ensure we’re completely and comprehensively reviewing all the comments we received.”

The decision on whether to allow Brewster Travel Canada to build an interpretative walkway on the Icefields Parkway was expected on Jan. 31.

Ogle said there has been feedback in support of the project and in opposition, but she couldn’t say what percentage of the feedback leans either way.

Parks will be releasing a report outlining what the public had to say after Jasper National Park Supt. Greg Fenton makes his decision.

If the online petition opposing the project is any indication, the feedback will be heavily weighted toward the opposition. As of Tuesday afternoon, nearly 180,000 Canadians had enter their names in an attempt to “Save Jasper National Park.”

The petition was presented to Fenton on Monday by three Jasperites, while a larger group stood outside the Parks Canada administration building.

Jack Templeton was one of the people to see Fenton. He said the petition, which he refers to as a survey, is an indication to both Parks and Brewster that Canadians don’t want more development in their national parks.

Templeton said if Canadians had been asked first, rather than after Brewster finished the design, the project wouldn’t have made it this far.

“A survey should have been done by Parks or Brewster,” he said. “That would have saved a lot of money and a lot of hassle.”

Art Jackson, who was outside the administration building on Monday, agreed. 

“All they had to do was ask, ‘Do we want some kind of futuristic development built in the middle of a national park icefield highway’ and Canadians would have said point blank, ‘No. We don’t need it. We don’t want it.’”

Jackson said between the petition and the written submissions, Fenton has “heard loud and clear from Canadians” that this project is inappropriate and unwanted. “They’re being told, don’t mess with our parks.” 

The Glacier Discovery Walk was designed by Sturgess Architecture, based out of Calgary. The design, which won an international architectural award last year, is for a 400-metre interpretative boardwalk, with a glass-floored observation platform suspended 30 metres out over the Sunwapta Valley. 

Brewster first proposed the project publicly in January 2011.

The idea is to build it at the Tangle Ridge Viewpoint on the Icefields Parkway where there is currently a pull-out with about 60 parking stalls. 

Brewster wants to remove that parking and have visitors instead take a free, 6.5-kilometre bus ride from the Glacier Discovery Centre to Tangle Ridge. From there, visitors would have the option to observe the landscape from a free public viewpoint, or they could purchase an admission ticket for an interpretative walk along The Discovery Trail, ultimately ending up on a 400-metre walkway overlooking the Sunwapta Valley.

Opponents of the walkway say that allowing it would be allowing the privatization of a segment of the park, but Brewster has argued that this project is not significantly different from any of the other private developments that already exist in Jasper.

“Whether it’s a ski resort, whether it’s a hotel ... the fact is we have services and we have infrastructure to provide visitors a great experience when they come to a national park,” Brewster Travel Canada president Michael Hannan told the Fitzhugh in an earlier interview.

Jackson said, as far as he’s concerned, there’s enough development in the park already, without the discovery walk.

“Development that has happened has happened over 40, 50, 60 years and it’s infrastructure that serves the people as it is. We don’t need more of it. More doesn’t mean better. We’ve already got lots. 

“What’s here serves all levels of interests from skiing Marmot to cruising the boat at Maligne. It’s all there. Enough’s enough.”